c. 1995 Religion News Service
(RNS)-Is it a problem best left to Congress or to the classroom teacher?
Lawmakers this year may consider two constitutional amendments that seek to protect and promote religious expression. A proposal by Rep. Henry Hyde, R-Ill., would prevent what he sees as discrimination against religious views in public venues, such as public schools. A measure advanced by Rep. Ernest Jim Istook, R-Okla., would permit student-sponsored prayer in public school classrooms.
But while lawmakers battle over which, if either, amendment to back, North Carolina author Warren A. Nord hopes Congress passes neither. Nord argues that the problem is too important to be left to politicians. Rather, he says, returning religion to its rightful place in the classroom and, by extension, the public square is a task for sympathetic educators.”The whole issue of religion and public school education has been polarized by press coverage, school board battles and court trials,”said Nord, who is director of the Program in the Humanities and Human Values at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.”The problem is that the issue has been taken out of the realm of education, where it belongs, and pulled into the political arena.” Nord, a philosopher by training, is author of”Religion and American Education: Rethinking a National Dilemma”(University of North Carolina Press). Arguing that education should include studying the role of religion in all areas of academic endeavor, Nord criticizes today’s public school and university classrooms for providing an”uncritically secular,”and therefore one-sided, perspective.
His 1995 book describes the political, philosophical, moral and constitutional reasons for teaching about religion, and it maintains that the First Amendment protects exactly such study.
A self-described liberal, Nord fell into the subject when, in the early 1980s, he received a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to study the religion clauses of the First Amendment. He began by exploring religion and education and, when he discovered a lack of sophisticated materials, decided to tackle the topic himself.
Over the next decade, as the debate over the role of religion in the classroom intensified, he expected another book to be published before his. But although there were polemics on either side of the debate, few scholars had looked at the issue from a neutral, philosophical point of view.”I take a middle course in the culture wars,”Nord said.”I agree with much of the critique that religious conservatives make of public education. It is hostile to religion. But I am a liberal and I can’t accept the conservatives’ solution. I wouldn’t have schools teach religion uncritically, and I am opposed to school prayer.” Nord wants religion integrated into all areas of study-from economics to evolution. He believes students should be exposed to”cultural conversations”that familiarize them with the ways in which society makes sense of the world.”Take an issue that’s important for religious liberals such as capitalism and the market economy,”Nord said.”Most economics courses teach neo-classical theory, which generally accepts the economic world as an arena for competition over scarce resources. But that view is in conflict with most mainline denominations. So why are we only teaching economics in a way that’s antithetical to religious principles?” Charles C. Haynes, scholar-in-residence at the Freedom Forum’s First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn., agrees that religion needs to be better integrated into the classroom. He has helped to spur local initiatives by producing resource materials for parents, students, and educators.
Haynes, together with lawyer Oliver Thomas, is co-author of”Finding Common Ground: A First Amendment Guide to Religion and Public Education”(The Freedom Forum First Amendment Center, 1995). Putting First Amendment principles into practice, the guide describes how to protect the religious-liberty rights of all students, how to take religion seriously in the curriculum and how to permit appropriate religious expression in the classroom.”The reason that this is coming to the fore now is because there is tremendous tension in the country about the proper role of religion in public life,”Haynes said.”These problems manifest themselves in the public schools because they are a microcosm for the public square.” But, according to Steven T. McFarland, director of the Christian Legal Society of the Center for Law and Religious Freedom in Annandale, Va., the reason for increased interest in religion and education is the prospect of a constitutional amendment.”As soon as (House Speaker) Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) said a year ago that the 104th Congress would have a vote on a school prayer amendment, groups on the left started discussing how to torpedo it,”McFarland said.”One of their ideas was that the American people need to know what rights they already have so they won’t support a constitutional amendment.”(BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM)
Some religious and civil liberties groups are concerned that a constitutional amendment would blur the distinction between church and state or prove coercive to religious minorities and non-believers.
Last July President Clinton outlined what religious practices are permissible in the nation’s classrooms. Clinton cited a variety of activities as protected by the Constitution: private prayer and Bible reading, the expression of religious beliefs in class assignments, the wearing of religious clothing, the discussion of religion among students, and teaching about religion in appropriate courses.
As a follow-up, the Department of Education sent copies of the president’s speech to school districts nationwide.
But some lawyers say the current law either isn’t understood or applied and that a constitutional amendment is needed for clarification.”Whether it’s a constitutional amendment or a statute, something has to be done. There has to be a change in the law,”said James Henderson, senior counsel for the American Center for Law and Justice at Virginia Beach, Va.
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Nord, who began his book long before the current debate erupted, believes that guaranteeing the neutrality provided by the religion clauses of the First Amendment is all that’s really needed. As Americans learn what their rights are, he sees movement in a positive direction.”There’s been movement in the right direction-like statements on equal access and on religious holidays-which has produced a consensus that says religion is important and it’s something that children should understand,”Nord said.”But I still go somewhat further. Teaching about religious ideas should be a part of a good education. Religion is sufficiently important to warrant its own field of study. It’s just too important to leave up to the sociologists and economists and historians.”
MJP END WINSTON
